How to Organize Your Beauty Collection During Isolation

Posted by Gin Mabey on Apr 15, 2020

Isolation Beauty Collection Maintenance Checklist

After you’ve done all the Spring cleaning, wardrobe organizing, and kitchen sorting, move on to your makeup stash! For those of us who get a thrill out of an organized collection (whether it’s makeup, shoes, or books) this is the ultimate isolation activity.

However, it can be hard to let go of those lippies and palettes we never use (and are probably super expired) for sentimental reasons. But it’s time to refresh, shed, and come out the end with only what we need.

The smell test

Smell those lipsticks, glosses, powders, palettes, and foundations. Do they smell funky? Do products that once smelled like caramel now smell like play dough? Do you barely remember when you bought them and have they been around longer than your current relationship? Bin them. Be ruthless.

The “do I wear it?” test

If you can’t remember the last time you wore a certain product and honestly can’t see yourself reaching for it any time soon, it’s a goner. All it’s doing is hanging around taking up the space that newer, more well-loved products could be hanging out in. Once it’s gone, you won’t even think about it.

Wash your brushes

Washing brushes, the job we all need to do more often, and now we have no excuse but to do it.

Put on a podcast, favorite music, movie, or trash reality TV, pour a glass of wine and set up a cleaning station. Set out a clean towel or paper towels on a clean bench. Fill a bowl with warm water and shampoo (or whatever brush cleaning product you use) and get into the rhythm of cleaning each brush until the water is no longer pigmented when you swish the brush in it.

Squeeze out as much liquid as you can, then stand the brushes up (bristle-side down) and pop them in the sun if you can.

Polish your packaging

Any other Monica Gellar’s out there? Hi! Yes, I like my makeup packaging to be as gleaming and pretty as the goodies inside. Take a microfiber cloth, dampen it slightly, and spritz it with antibacterial spray. Wipe down your products to remove caked makeup, dust, and get a gleaming shine going. Ahhh, so satisfying.

Sort by season

If your collection is vast, pick out your Spring and Summer colors and formulas and put them in their own casing or drawer close by. Just like you do with clothes, it’s handy to have the right “makeup wardrobe” ready and waiting.

Do a try-test to rediscover forgotten products

Okay, not every unused product should be tossed, as some have just been unfortunate enough to be pushed aside for more regular “go-to” shades. If you come across a product that hasn’t expired, and it still sparks your interest, pop it in a “trial pile”. At the end of your sorting process, have a try-on session to discover whether these forgotten goodies deserve to be on regular rotation.

Got other tips? Let us know how you organize your beauty collection in the comments below!

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Gin Mabey

Gin is a beauty enthusiast with a passion for makeup she's had since kindergarten when she would raid her Mum's makeup drawer. When she's not playing with new products and writing about makeup, she's a theatre actress, director and producer.

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